Love Lost, Memories Cherished
by Tattles
Summary: A stranger meets Jack on an alien planet, hearing the haunting tune of 'Nature Boy' the stranger can not help but apply it to Jack's story.


**Title: **Love Lost, Memories Cherished  
**Rating:** PG, it just mild angst, not even that.  
**Word count: **605  
**Pairings: **Jack/Ianto – implied slightly.  
**Spoilers/Warnings: **Children of Earth, Doctor Who – End of Time. It all mostly implied but it could ruin it if you haven't seen them.  
**Summary: **A stranger meets Jack on an alien planet, hearing the haunting tune of 'Nature Boy' the stranger can not help but apply it to Jack's story  
**A****/N:** I was listening to Nature Boy on a whim and suddenly this image of an older Jack lonely, lost and grieving after all the events of CoE and so I started typing. Hope you like it. By the way Shaloonamon is completely made up, so I own that in the whole fic.  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Torchwood, Captain Jack Harkness or the song Nature Boy, which belongs to Moulin Rouge and David Bowe. I do in fact own a copy of all the Torchwood DVDs but the copyright belongs to the BBC, luck bums.

* * *

"_This story is about Love, the man he Loved is dead"_

It was one afternoon that I was passing through the lost markets of Shaloonamon that I saw him. Sitting alone on a bar stool, a half empty glass in hand and a bitter-sweet look in his eyes. Eyes that held wisdom beyond his years, pain sorrow and memories of love.

They told me he was a traveller from long ago and times to come.

The distant words of a street musician hummed in my ears

"_There was a boy  
A very strange enchanted boy"_

Wondering over I ordered my own drink, sitting next to the mysterious man. Glancing at him I saw a far off look of grief.

"_They say he wandered very far, very far  
Over land and sea  
A little shy and sad of eye"_

He look at me then, the pain in his eyes intensified, focused on me. I saw in his eyes an infinite wisdom, so innate that it over flowed effecting those around him.

"_But very wise was he"_

Wisdom permeated his soul, it seeped his very being and oozed from his pores. Raising his glass in a toast to me he drowned the last of the drink in a gulp, waving it at the bartender for another.

"Drink up if you wish to drown your sorrows, look into it if you wish to see life's meaning" his words were tainted with bitterness, with the knowledge of long time drinker, and they tugged at my heart. The man had lost so much, likely see so much, and the only constant for him seemed to be the drink in his hand.

"_And then one day  
One magic day he passed my way"_

Taking a drink of my own glass I asked, "Where you from, Stranger?" He shrugged and gulped his new drink; the bartender refilled it without his asking.

"I'm a traveller. Once knew a wise man who showed me more to life. Hadn't met him and I wouldn't have known _Him_" The way he said him was like a spike in the heart and a burst of pure joy at once. The conflicting feelings pouring off the stranger out me into a turmoil. The musician sung on in the background, his tune haunting me. I glanced over my shoulder at the man singing, the stranger next to me must have seen for he said.

"It's an very old song. From the 21st century, use to be called Nature Boy. Was haunting back then too"

I glanced between to the two of them, the musician and the stranger.

"_And while we spoke of many things  
Fools and kings"_

From his one comment about the song sprung a conversation, it was stilted and full of pauses but enlightening. And as he drained his drink for the hundredth time he looked at me, placing his money on the table, he said,

"_This he said to me  
"The greatest thing you'll ever learn  
Is just to Love and be Loved in return" "_

And with those parting words, lyrics from the song that had more meaning coming from that wisdom soaked stranger, he left the market. What or where he went from there I do not know but his words have followed me since. And so I it came to be that I found that great love he spoke of, someone to just love and be loved by in return.

Though I have my love the memory of his pain still haunts me, I sincerely hope that he sees his great love one day soon, before he loses even the memory of love.


End file.
